Helpline and Development

The Helpline is a listening ear and signposting service for Muslim women across Scotland. We run the Helpline Monday to Friday – 10am – 4pm for any Muslim-identified women, and on Wednesdays from 6pm – 9pm for young Muslims women (ages 16-25). It is free from mobiles and landlines and will not appear on your phone bill. All calls are strictly confidential and non-judgemental; we always deal with clients in a faith and culturally-sensitive manner.

If you need to talk to someone or have a problem and don’t know where to go the Amina Helpline can help you get started by listening to you and signpost you to organisations that may be able to offer help and advice for your problem.

The top ten reasons women call us are:

Family

Marital/Relationship

Domestic Abuse

Mental Health

Divorce

Child Sexual Abuse

Social Isolation

Housing

Agencies seeking support with signposting on behalf of their clients

Immigration

The helpline is funded by the Scottish Government and we have recently increased the number of volunteers, adding to the range of language and telephone skills. We can help women in English, Arabic, Punjabi, Urdu. Any other languages can be accessed using a translating service as required.

Introducing our new services!

Amina: Let’s Talk

We have launched a helpline dedicated to meeting the unique needs of Muslim women and girls, aged 16-25, around Scotland.

lturally sensitive, and won’t show up on your phone bill. The Young Women’s Helpline is available on several platforms – phone, email, and live online chat. This service is available Wednesdays from 6 to 9 PM. We encourage any young women who feel they might benefit from a listening ear, to get in touch.

During Helpline hours, a ‘Live Chat’ button will appear on the bottom-right side of your screen anywhere on the Amina MWRC website.

You may have to click ‘OK’ about the collection of website cookies, at the bottom of the site before the chat box appears.

Call 08088010301 or email TalkToUs@mwrc.org.uk

Shaykh on the Helpline

Don’t miss out on your chance to ask the Shaykh any questions or queries during our monthly phone in! For the first time Amina MWRC are giving you the chance to speak to the Shaykh in confidence on a wide range of issues.

Topics for each month will be advertised on our social media and on our events page

Arabic Hours

On Fridays from 10 am to 2 pm there will be a dedicated Arabic-speaking Helpline staff.

If you feel you have been a victim of a crime because of your race, religion, disability status, sexual orientation or transgender identity and you do not want to approach the police in the first instance then you can contact Amina Helpline and we will make the report to the police on your behalf.

Watch below as Sarah reads a letter to her perpetrator – someone that committed a Hate Crime on her due to her faith.

If you have experienced a hate crime, and could say something to your perpetrator, what would you say? Let us know by Tweeting us or on Facebook or email.

Roadshows

We recognise that engagement with the community is vital to our work and to making our services better. Annually, we visit different locations around Scotland to capture a variety of voices from different communities of Muslim Women.

Given that hate crime has been on the rise, we asked women what impact it was having on their lives and discussed ways in which we could help make a more cohesive society. Events like “Tea With Me” were created around feedback from the women to make their thoughts a reality. A short report of other ideas gathered from the women is available here.

In previous years we have used the roadshows to create our first campaign “I Speak for Myself” which was based on creating slogans to combat stereotypes. This year we will be taking this further by asking women how we as an organisation can support them to speak for themselves and how we can influence change to direct society in a positive direction.

To get in touch and set up a workshop with Amina, please visit our contact page and let us know where you are.